Yīng mán

The contents of this post are neither new nor insightful. They are the observations of a dilettante in a field he has no business treading into. These observations, though profound to myself, are undoubtedly well-worn to more weathered eyes. But they are interesting to me, which is what matters most in determining how the valuable column inches of my blog are apportioned. 

English is the lingua franca of the world! That grand declaration is often repeated. When I was in the eleventh grade, I once listened to a guest speaker, an international businessman, tell other students and me that we need not worry much about language problems abroad. It was at a day-long conference, and the speaker was giving a talk about international careers to a room of about 30 of us high school students. A student expressed her concern that her intermediate-level German would not be good enough for international work with Germany. I forget what exactly her question was, and am fearful of recounting it wrong. But I remember distinctly the speaker’s answer. English is more than enough! He told us. Most countries understand English, will use English to communicate, and if not, you’ll have translators. The guest speaker, addressing all of us, said that putting our time to other skills might be a better use of our time. I don’t know if he was going for the shock factor or for helpful advice, but he continued on and told us not to let our American self guilt force us to spend so much time learning languages when it is not that necessary. 

During my time here, I often thought about this businessman. In my first few weeks here, I knew that English was the language of law, business, and academia. Nevertheless, I continue to be surprised at seeing, in person, how deeply the English language has planted its many flags on HK society. I always knew that it did, and I always knew how it did. Colonial legacies and globalization are waves that do not break softly. Still, I’m always surprised.

My students (in nearly all fields except Chinese language) tell me that their professors teach classes in English, and assign papers in English. And yet, my students tell me that they rarely use English outside the classroom. Among friends, family, and in almost every quarter of their lives, Cantonese or Mandarin is used. During office hours, I sometimes asked my students when they last read a book cover to cover in English. They often said secondary six (twelfth grade in the US). I often pressed to the next question: so what do you read in English? Many said only in academic articles in their field, or assignment handouts. We always laughed after this remark. So few of the words spoken here are in English, yet so much of the words written here are. 

In many of the bilingual online contracts I have signed, there is a caveat at the bottom that says something along the lines of: in the event of a dispute between the two languages, the English version prevails. I wish I screenshotted some of these contracts, but will do so the next time I come across these caveats. Anyways, such is the legal capital of the English language. Even though English is rarely used by my students in most contexts, it is used in the most important ones. 

Yesterday I saw a mother walking along with her child on the grounds outside our campus. Her child was toddling along the pavement. “Be careful!” she said sweetly to her son. And then they resumed their mother-son talk in Cantonese. The son seemed to be around four to five years old. This is a minute sample out of many, but I was struck by the fluid and natural way that English was peppered into her Cantonese. Why not “siu sam” or “xiao xin”? I’m sure all these languages might be used interchangeably if I were to follow the mother and her son around for a whole day, but the fluidity with the way she interspersed the rhythm and content of her Cantonese with English stuck with me. 

Of course, other elements of Hong Kong life are held firmly within the territory of Cantonese and Mandarin. The most up to date or well-contributed to online forums, group messages, are mostly in Cantonese. English swear words do not hold a candle to Cantonese swear words. The baddest English swear words can’t compare to the meanings of some of these knock-em dead Cantonese swear words. Restaurant menus in areas without Westerners, like Tai Po Market, will not pack their menus with English. Names are interesting. Some students are called by their friends in their English names, some in their Chinese names. My thoughts haven’t matured on this part of life.  

It seems obvious to say this, but multilingual societies are not composed of an even split between its languages. Multilingualism in a society is not unique, but the values a society attaches to each of its multiple languages, I believe, are unique. I think of the French, Russian, and English that were tossed around fluidly in one conversation within nineteenth century St. Petersburg society (at least, in a Tolstoy novel). I then think of, closer to Hong Kong, the multilingual societies influenced by the Chinese diaspora in the nanyang (of which Hong Kong is a part): from the Philippines, across Indonesia, and to Malaysia. 

Rather than being on equal footing with each other, languages seem to stand on separate planes in a multilingual society. The languages here in Hong Kong serve different roles — and are attached with different values. All I know is that one needs to be armed with a multilingual society’s multiple languages to penetrate its cultural fog.